Inspired by the recent conversations regarding Qián Xuántóng 钱玄同, this month the minor topolect is that of his hometown, Húzhōu 湖州, or as they (allegedly) say in the dialect, Wuzei. More than that, I spent so much time sorting through blurred photocopies of Húzhōu dialect pronunciations for the 让 post that I felt for the damage my eyes have incurred I ought to put it all to good use.
Depending on who you ask, Húzhōu dialect has 7 or 8 tones. I’m going with 8 as it’s significantly more badass. In the 7-tone scheme, 阴去 and 阳去 are combined. The following tone table is from the Journal of Huzhou Teacher’s College with the examples coming from another source using a 7-tone system, hence the misplaced 去声 characters.
| 阴 | 阳 | |||||
| 平 | 55 | 江 天 飞 开 | 23 | 来 同 骂 洞 | ||
| 上 | 52 | 懂 纸 有 买 | 31 | 是 道 静 策 | ||
| 去 | 24 | 13 | 对 去 庙 画 | |||
| 入 | 5 | 各 黑 脱 出 | 2 | 绿 石 肉 读 |
I’m not going to go too much into the phonetics here below are a few quick examples.
门 [mən] 毛 [mɔ] 风 [foŋ] 上 [zɔ~] 力 [liɛʔ] 酒 [ʨiy]
Few words end in /ŋ/, specifically those with an -ong or -iong ending. In most cases the /ŋ/ ending turns into a nasalisation of the preceding vowel and 入声 syllables tend to end with /ʔ/.
Next month’s minor topolect will go into a bit more detail including sentences and sandhi*
- – -
* إن شاء الله
Nice ending with Insha Allah
seemed appropriate
Do you know what the difference is between the 阳去 characters that went to 阳平 (骂，洞) and the ones that stayed in 去声 (庙, 画)?
I do not. I’m only just beginning to figure out some of the tone shift things in general. I couldn’t tell you why some went to 平 and some stayed in 去.
Since the example characters are coming from a source with only 7 tones given, while other give 8, that may be part of it. But I’m just guessing.